


Ghost Ranch

by warriorpoet



Category: Breaking Bad
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Gen, Grief/Mourning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-24
Updated: 2015-01-24
Packaged: 2018-03-08 20:52:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3223064
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/warriorpoet/pseuds/warriorpoet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jesse and Walt try to avoid the elephant in the cemetery.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ghost Ranch

**Author's Note:**

  * For [VillaKulla](https://archiveofourown.org/users/VillaKulla/gifts).



Jesse's nose was buried in soft white petals, the sweetest smell curled in his sinuses and settled deep in his lungs, when he realised he had no idea what she would've wanted.

"I never... I never bought her flowers," Jesse mumbled, pulling the bouquet away from his face. They looked pretty, they smelled pretty, but he didn't know. "I gotta get the right ones, but I... I don't know what she liked."

He'd thought there would've been time for that kind of stupid-in-love romantic shit, giving Jane flowers and finding out when her birthday was and buying jewellery and chocolates or whatever she wanted. He'd thought all that might come later. He'd thought there'd be a later.

Walt shifted behind him, regretting almost everything. "It's really more a symbolic gesture than anything, Jesse. It doesn't matter – whatever you get will be fine."

Jesse hesitated, all the colors of the flowers blurring in front of him as he scanned the racks. 

"Yeah. Yeah, these are good."

He stalked up to the counter, bouquet clenched in one fist, cash in the other, leaving Walter behind him to shuffle awkwardly by the florist's door.

\---

Jesse clutched the flowers so tightly that they were already starting to wilt, choking out what life they still had in them.

"Thanks for coming with me."

Walt nodded and kept his eyes on the road.

"I kinda wanted to do this for ages. And then, the other day, you know, with the fly? When you were talking about Jane and meeting her dad the night she died? It – I don't know, I just couldn't stop thinking about it. Like, more than normal. I talked about her at a meeting and people said I should go to her grave, but I didn't want to go alone, so – just thanks, is all."

"It's fine, Jesse. You thanked me once. That's enough."

"Yeah, but... it means a lot. I know you... with the money and the heroin and everything, I know you didn't really like Jane."

"Well, no, I... no that isn't – I didn't know her, to really say one way or the other."

The tissue paper on the bouquet rustled as Jesse shifted his grip, poking at displaced leaves and drooping petals.

"Shit, I can't even keep some flowers alive for five goddamn minutes." Jesse laughed, voice thick with unshed tears.

The Aztek pulled up at the cemetery. Walt turned to him as he shut off the engine, but Jesse got out without another word.

\---

Jesse trudged from grave to grave, scanning the headstones.

"There are ways to find out exactly where the grave is," Walt said from behind him, fighting to keep his voice even despite the long, morbid walking tour this little outing was turning into. "I can go back, ask somebody."

"Nah, it's – it's okay."

Jesse had to admit he kind of liked the idea of looking for her and seeking her out. It was like for a second he could pretend that she was alive and he was supposed to meet her somewhere crowded, that he'd catch sight of her and his heart would thrill.

It was kind of hard to pretend that when he was in a cemetery, and looking for her name on a headstone and not... actually her, but...

Jesse chewed on his lip, swiped his sleeve under his nose. Behind him, Walt grimaced at the dropped line of Jesse's shoulders.

"I guess you never think about how many dead people there are," Jesse said, for something to say that wasn't thanking Mr. White for coming yet again and pissing him off. "Like, the past few months, I've been around more dead people than I have in my whole life, but just this one cemetery, you realize, you know, that's just, like, a really small amount of dead people. It's nothing."

When Jesse looked back, Walt's face was contorted with something Jesse couldn't quite read. Disbelief, disgust, pain. Jesse turned away from him again.

"Sorry, I – sorry."

He felt like an asshole. Mr. White was almost one of them, a headstone and a box in the ground, something that had to be remembered instead of seen. And the dead people, _their_ dead people... as much as Jesse had blamed himself for Combo and Jane, Mr. White had actually killed Emilio and Krazy 8. How the hell could Jesse know what that was like?

"You must think about it a lot," he said.

"What?" Walt's stomach dropped and he felt lightheaded. It was as though Jesse could suddenly clearly see the weight Walt carried on him, as though Jane's body was slung over his shoulders. "What do you mean?"

Jesse kept fighting the silence. "I mean, like... you know. The cancer. How close you got to checking out. Obviously you thought about dying a lot, since you were... getting ready for it. With everything. Preparing."

Walt sighed, long and slow. "I try not to think about it. Just accept it. It's going to happen. It's going to happen to all of us, sooner or later. It's part of being human."

"Yeah, but... it's the sooner or later part of it that's the kicker, right? Especially if you're expecting later and end up with sooner."

"Yeah."

Jesse walked, looking, the reassuring sound of Walt's footsteps behind him keeping him going. He bowed his head to smell the flowers he cradled against his chest, and then he saw her.

Like when he'd gone to Ginny's grave the first time, he'd hoped that there'd be... something. Not a ghost, exactly, but some kind of presence. The light falling in such a way that he could imagine Jane with her back against the headstone, knees pulled up and balancing a sketch book, a curtain of dark hair obscuring her face. Like he'd seen her on the front stoop of the duplex. Like he'd seen her in his bed.

Nothing was there. Just letters and numbers.

_JANE MARGOLIS_  
1982 – 2009  
Beloved Daughter 

Jesse stopped.

"Here she is," he murmured, anticlimactic, the flowers twisting in his hands.

Walt cleared his throat. "I'll, ah – I'll give you some privacy."

"No, wait!" Jesse turned around, suddenly panicked as Mr. White started to walk away. "Yo, the whole reason I asked if you'd come is 'case I didn't wanna do this alone, man. Just... can you just stay? Just for a second?"

Walt stayed in place, his feet taking root in the well-fed earth.

"Look, I'm sorry for that shit I said, about... all the death stuff, if I upset you. I'm just... I hate this, and I'm just running my mouth, and... I don't know. I need you here, Mr. White. Please."

"Yeah." Walt swallowed, a dry, clicking sound, like bones rattling in a casket. "Sure, Jesse. It's fine. I'm here."

Jesse turned back to Jane's grave and carefully stepped forward to place the flowers against the headstone, quickly jerking back as though if he got too close, her hand would shoot up and drag him down to stay with her. That wouldn't be so bad, maybe, to be curled up against her in the deepest of sleep again, her arm around him, their heads on the same pillow. Forever. Nothing to get between them ever again. Then he flipped to the other side of the coin and thought of being buried alive, of waking up next to her dead body again and again for the rest of his life, captured his imagination and held him hostage for a moment. His eyes pricked with tears and he gulped at the air, suddenly glad to be above ground.

The exact same thing, and it could be either heaven or hell. 

Jesse stepped forward again, hand on the headstone, cold like her skin was the last time he touched her. He wanted to lean down, press his lips to the marble, but it would've been stupid, a meaningless gesture, like Mr. White said. 

Walt looked away, looked around, stared off into the distance, far away, _anywhere_ but that time and place. He wanted to reach out to Jesse, to try to comfort him in some way, not only to alleviate his own guilt, but to _help_ the boy, who was clearly suffering. Inaction seized him once again, held him frozen for his own best interests. Comforting Jesse too much might make him suspicious. Coming to the cemetery at all was once again dancing too close to the line that he'd almost crossed that night in the lab.

"She was a good person," Jesse said quietly.

Walt's attention snapped back. Jesse looked at him earnestly, begging him to believe. 

"She was a good person," he repeated. "She gave me a break when I needed it. When nobody else would. I mean... if she could do it over again, she'd probably stay way the fuck away from me, but... she was a good person."

Mr. White stared blankly back at him.

"I, uh... we can go now. I'm done."

"Alright."

Walt started off, and Jesse took one last look at his flowers slumped against Jane's headstone.

_Beloved Daughter_ , underlined by wilted petals.

"I, uh... her Dad is buried nearby, I think. Did you want to stop by and see his grave? Since, you know, you talked to him and stuff. And he gave you advice. Never give up on family, right?"

Walt hesitated a second, before his strides grew longer and faster. 

He'd never investigated further to find out if Donald Margolis had died. He'd switched off that radio report about his suicide attempt and forced himself to forget about it. He hadn't known. He contemplated the astronomical improbability of the events that brought them all into the same orbit, and yet he hadn't wanted to know if the man had survived his own immeasurable burden of grief and guilt.

"No. No. I didn't know the man. I'm sure you knew him better than I did."

"I didn't know him at all... dude just hated me and wanted to kick me out of his house."

"Well... there you go."

Jesse jogged a little to catch up with him.

"Thanks again, Mr. White."

Walt didn't respond. 

Together they walked out of the cemetery, each in his own silence.


End file.
